Recently, Delhi government announced free surgeries at private hospitals for patients with a wait list of beyond 30 days at government hospitals. Is Dharamshila Hospital one of the private hospital partners under this initiative? What are your views about the initiative?

We were not part of the scheme until we got merged with Narayana Hrudayalaya in April this year. Actually, we have applied for the scheme now. May be in the next 10-15 days, we will be made a part of this programme.

As for views, there is definitely a dearth in the supply of medical facilities. Available government facilities are always going to be overused because of their accessibility to larger community. However, I think it’s a great idea for private hospital players to be a part of this programme and serve people in their capacity.

As a group, we already have been doing a lot of such activities. We have been a part of micro-insurance scheme, which was initiated by our chairman Dr Devi Prasad Shetty, in which farmers in Karnataka are empanelled with only Rs 20 premium per month and committed free surgical cover and diagnostic facilities for them and their families. The model has inspired government too.

How do free surgeries impact the hospital’s revenues?

It doesn’t have any impact on a hospital’s revenue because the treatment or surgical costs get reimbursed by the government. It is free only from patients’ perspectives. Government and hospitals do have defined rate cards for treatments and surgeries.

However, if you create a five-star luxurious hospital then the cost of care will increase too. But if the hospital is more focussed on technology and understands the efficiency at lower costs, it can survive at much lower price points.

What latest have been happening at Dharamshila?

We have been looking to transform Dharamshila into multi-speciality tertiary care hospital. Besides having facilities for medical, surgical and radiation oncology, we have very successful bone marrow transplant programme which is a respected programme in terms of clinical understanding of the quality we deliver.

In addition, we also train doctors to specialize in medical, radiation and surgical oncology. Across a network of 23 hospitals in India, about 800-900 doctors are getting trained with us. We are also now bringing our expertise onto cardiac surgeries. We are also introducing organ transplant programme. As a super speciality player, there are many investment plans for the hospital. We are aiming to strengthen the hospital’s critical care and emergency facilities and hence investments will go into critical care beds and OT infrastructure. In the coming 3-6 months, a lot of changes would be witnessed.

Are there any expansion plans?

We have already announced our expansion in Delhi NCR with another project in Gurgaon, which should be commissioned by the last quarter of this year.

How is the influx of foreign patients at your hospital?

Our international patients are primarily from African continents, Middle East and Bangladesh. We do have fairly large number of patients from Africa for bone marrow transplants and medical oncology programme. Typically, they result in a total influx of 8-10% of international patients. These patients come to India for treatment because of the lack of facilities in their own country.

What are the challenges a hospital faces in oncology?

I think the trends remain the same across all specialities. As we move forward, there will be need for more doctors, technicians, nurses, staff etc. The biggest challenge has been to retain the skilled manpower. Another challenge that remains is the cost of care in case of cancer. At the end of the day, we need to bring the cost down for patients and community. Healthcare can’t be expensive.

How can the cost of care be brought down?

Volume plays major role. With large number of patients, the cost of inputs, materials, supplies could be brought down so that the benefit can be passed on to patients.

With a brand reputation that we have, we work with lot of partner agencies who help us get patients treated for free. They are the sponsor agencies with intentions of helping communities.

With immense pride “India Live” celebrated its 10th national conference in Mumbai from 28th February to 3rd March 2019. The conference turned out to be a gold mine of information, with emphasis on academics, education and exchange of knowledge with leaders in interventional cardiology from both India and abroad.